


Bro, It's Just a Crush

by gaywrongs



Category: LOONA (Korea Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, F/F, Rated T for language, bro yveseul and side chuuves bc this is for the og rf stans, writing cracked cheesy fics w/out character development or plot is SELF CARE and I am VALID
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-26
Updated: 2019-06-26
Packaged: 2020-05-20 04:59:31
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,486
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19370134
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/gaywrongs/pseuds/gaywrongs
Summary: The pretty girl’s eyes crinkled a bit behind round frames as her lips shyly curved up at Haseul again. This time, Haseul freaked out.“Sooyoung.” Haseul was the one to burst into her own room later that evening, desperate. “Sooyoung, I need wooing tips. Now.”Or: Haseul has a crush. Her friends are no help.





	Bro, It's Just a Crush

**Author's Note:**

> this, as always, went way better in my head than in execution, but haseul = gay mess, and we just need more of that and viseul all the time always 24/7 please godsunmi

Haseul had always been one of the bros.

As a young kid, she would never cringe away shrieking from a ball tossed in her general direction, like all of the other girls her age did. The boys would try to pull her hair and make her cry, and she would simply tighten the velcro straps on her dirty sneakers and chase after them with a small fist waving threateningly in the air. After a while, the boys gave up on trying to make her fit their idea of what a girl should be like. She reached her pre-teen years with a gang of sweaty, baseball-obsessed guys who never really questioned her presence; after all, she dressed like them (she once got away with wearing the same pair of torn-up jeans for two weeks in a row), she had a mean curveball (other groups of boys would laugh at them for having a _girl_ be their pitcher, until they blinked at the plate and found themselves struck out), and they knew she could and would beat them up if they challenged her (poor Jihyun).

They cursed each other out during weekend video game marathons; they made fun of each other for crying when they crashed their bikes; they exemplified the awful adage “boys will be boys” quite well, and Haseul had always been included in that.

Until high school came along, and with it the awkward beginnings of growth into maturity.

For the boys, that meant noticing something other than themselves, which meant, quite simply: _Girls._

“Bros, you know who’s hot?” Hankyung spoke into the quiet of their lunch corner. No one had an immediate answer, eyes shifting around the table to gauge how the others might react to a name, chewing mouths stalling as they wondered what the qualities of “hot” were. Haseul, legs spread wide in her seat, didn’t bother to look up from where she devoured her sandwich.

“Jiyoon?” Seonghan offered before the silence got too awkward.

“Dude, what? Jiyoon’s not hot. She’s weird,” Jaegun said.

“No, not Jiyoon. Euna. Euna’s so hot, dude.” Hankyung leaned back in his chair and nodded to himself.

“Euna’s not hot,” Dongmin protested. “She’s like, a six.”

Hankyung threw a wrapper at him. “She’s at _least_ an eight. Jiyoon’s okay, though.”

“You have some shit taste in women, bro. Come on. Minji?” Jaegun pointed across the cafeteria at a girl with dyed hair who was laughing, oblivious to the musings of boys, with her own friends. “Now _she’s_ beautiful.”

“Nahh. She’s not beautiful, she’s just like, pretty, in that dumb way though.”

“None of her friends are attractive either. Like damn.”

“Jinsol’s pretty cute,” Haseul offhandedly gave her input around a messy mouthful of food.

“Jinsol, in our grade?” Seonghan was the only one to analyze her opinion like she was just like the others. The other boys blinked at her for a moment, as if realizing something terrifyingly important for the first time.

“Wait, what the hell, you can’t say that,” said Jaegun.

“Yeah Haseul, you can’t think Jinsol’s cute,” said Dongmin.

Haseul couldn’t see why not. She stole one of Seonghan’s chips and munched on it, not caring that she spewed crumbs as she spoke. “Why the hell not? Jinsol’s cuter than Euna, that’s for sure. And hotter than Minji.”

Hankyung coughed. “Dude… you’re a girl.”

Haseul knew this. “And?”

The boys, save Seonghan, exchanged an awkward look of uncomfortable realization.

And thus, the boys suddenly understood that they were boys, but Haseul was a girl, and according to the rules of the universe that they were only just beginning to awaken to, maybe she wasn’t quite the bro they had always seen her as.

“And Jinsol’s not even that hot,” Seonghan finished, oblivious to the other boys’ revelation.

The others murmured in rushed agreement.

“But Jihyo though? She’s _fine_.” Dongmin pounded a fist on the table. Haseul agreed, but said nothing. The pickles in her sandwich had started to taste sour. The boys changed subjects soon, to how annoying certain English teachers were (“I got points off for writing ‘stan’ instead of ‘stand’ like, what’s the freakin’ difference?”), but as time went on, the conversation drifted away from shy petty talk to boasts of a “body count” and “bet I can make that lesbian Jungeun go straight”, and so drifted Haseul away from them and their objectifying behavior.

Except for Seonghan.

“Fuck off, Seonghan.”

“Why’re you being so moody? You’re acting like a fuckin’ girl. Why don’t you hang with the squad anymore?”

“I _am_ a fuckin’ girl.”

“You know what I mean, ‘Seul.”

“I’m a girl, and I like girls. That’s why.” Haseul was more irritated than sickened with anticipation of his reaction, as she would be with anyone else, except maybe her little sister. After all, it was just Seonghan.

“Well, fuck. I like girls too.”

“Idiot. It’s _different._ ”

“It’s only different ‘cause you’re ugly and I’m hot.”

Just Seonghan. That idiot.

He swatted her arm. She socked him right back.

And then, it was just the two of them, planning pranks on their old buddies that they never got around to executing, and then traveling to late night fast food chains in Seonghan’s beat up, hand-me-down sedan when the stress of university applications was too much. And then Haseul was laughing through tears of her own at Seonghan’s blubbering face when they both got accepted into the same school, Seonghan in disbelief at his ability to overcome academic laziness, and Haseul at the prospect of finally being able to leave the small hometown that had only grown in its stifling expectations.

At university, they were forced to live in separate dorms designated for men and women. After muttering angrily for a bit about the unfairness of a heterosexually-minded society, Haseul realized that it might’ve actually turned out for the better. She’d seen how Seonghan maintained his room at home, which was to say, not at all.

And Haseul was beginning to accept that she was super into girls. And her new roommate was, well, a girl. An extremely pretty girl.

“Hi, I’m Sooyoung!”

The girl with an awkward but endearing grin and a godly fit figure also turned out to be a part-time model by the name of Yves (with the most Instagram followers Haseul had ever seen for anyone non-famous. Not that Haseul immediately began to stalk her social media after meeting her). She was nice, if a bit shy at first, but warmed up to Haseul quickly and had no problems exchanging rants about their day-to-day lives. She also had the biggest trail of broken hearts that Haseul could barely conceptualize. Especially when she realized that these exes were all girls.

“You’re gay too?!” Haseul all but shrieked. Sooyoung had just nonchalantly began another sighing tirade over someone trying to hit her up again, and Haseul had tuned out because she had a midterm in two days (the semester had just started! What was higher education!), and couldn’t really be bothered with straight shenanigans, until she belatedly caught wind of “...nice eyes. A pity she’s just experimenting… but I think I might actually like this other girl anyway…” and Haseul nearly dropped her laptop.

Sooyoung blinked at her from her side of the cramped college dorm room. “You didn’t know?”

“How was I supposed to know?” Haseul cried.

Sooyoung stared for a second before looking meaningfully at the assortment of rainbow-themed decorations atop her desk, a poster of Sunmi above her bed, her neatly trimmed nails… 

Haseul smashed her face into her laptop keyboard to hide from Sooyoung’s amused smirk.

“You’re never going to let me live this down, are you?” She whispered.

“I will, once I turn straight. I’ll keep you posted.”

Yves’ humour was more subtle and teasing than Seonghan’s brash cursing, but Haseul could already tell these two in her life would make things a lot more difficult. Hopefully they would never be in the same room together. Haseul lifted her head after she felt the redness on her ears had resided enough. She avoided her roommate’s teasing (and pretty) eyes and focused on her screen.

Before her sat a page full of Fs.

Seonghan and Sooyoung met the very next day.

“No dude, Sunmi’s so fuckin’ hot!”

“I know! Did you see that one concert where --”

Haseul burst into her shared room, backpack hanging askew from one shoulder, smuggled dining commons muffin in hand. Seonghan lay on his stomach atop her previously-made bed, nodding along to whatever Yves was saying from her criss-crossed position on her own bed. They looked like two elementary school kids having a sleepover and talking about their crushes. It would have been cute if it hadn’t been Sooyoung and Seonghan.

“What the hell?!” She dropped her bookbag to the floor with a clunk for emphasis.

“Hi Haseul,” Sooyoung greeted without even a glance in her direction, “Yeah, and then she goes and lies on the floor and like, gestures for her dancer to --”

“What are you doing in my room?!” Haseul nearly shrieked. Seonghan hadn’t texted her in a couple of days, both too busy with “studying” (Haseul freaking out over an imperfectly printed study guide, Seonghan begging his professors for an extension), and suddenly he was on her bed with his dirty ass shoes still on, chatting with her roommate as if they’d been best friends for years.

He had the gall to look offended. “Well I _was_ havin’ a nice conversation with your gorgeous roommate, but then _some_ loud ass interrupted.”

Sooyoung looked flattered. “Me? Gorgeous?”

“I didn’t believe ‘Seul when she said so, ‘cause she just thinks all girls are hot and goes into anaphylactic shock when any woman deadass so much as smiles at her,” Seonghan nodded at her knowingly, “but yeah you, who else in this room beautiful as fuck?”

Haseul sputtered in disbelief, not sure which offense to address first. “She’s not interested!” is what she ended up blurting out. Seonghan gave her a look that said _well, no shit,_ just as Sooyoung innocently answered Seonghan’s rhetorical question:

“I mean, Haseul’s here.”

To hide the redness on her cheeks, Haseul chucked the muffin at Seonghan. Hooting at her flustered state, he caught it easily and took a bite. Haseul huffed. She had forgotten that Seonghan had been the only one brave enough to be the catcher to her deadly pitches as kids.

“Yeah, see dude? Like I was sayin’ before, you gotta give her some tips,” Seonghan said around a mouthful, crumbs spewing onto Haseul’s bed. “She’s useless.” He offered the muffin to Sooyoung, who took a much less messy bite than he had.

“Seriously? She’s never dated anyone?” It was unfair that Sooyoung could look good talking with her mouth full.

Seonghan snorted. “I mean, aside from sayin’ I’m her boyfriend, to get folks back home off her back, not a single damn soul. Unless that kickback with Jinsol…? I’m like sixty-four percent sure they made out but ‘Seul ain’t tell me --”

“Shut. The fuck. Up.” Haseul ordered through gritted teeth. She swatted his legs aside and flopped onto her bed beside him, face squashed into her pillow in embarrassment.

“Hey, Haseul, that’s not a nice thing to say to your boyfriend,” Sooyoung chided, voice deadpan.

Haseul gagged and smacked Seonghan’s stomach without turning her face to look. “This loser’s just a beard, and not even a good one.”

“Yeah, ‘cause I’m too pretty for you.” Seonghan spat out more crumbs, Haseul could just tell.

“Hey, you’ve had as much luck with girls as I have,” Haseul reminded him bitterly. “Remember when you tried to ask Jiyoon out and you tripped on your --”

She was interrupted by a stuffed animal to the gullet. The two soon devolved into a pillow fight, with Haseul screeching at Seonghan to put down her deer plushie or Yubin so help her she would make him wish he had never gotten into university. Sooyoung calmly finished off the muffin in the meanwhile, waiting for their aggression to die down, before clearing her throat. The two looked up sheepishly.

“Well,” Sooyoung said, stretching until her joints popped (and even _that_ didn’t lessen her attractiveness, like, how unfair could the universe _be_ ). “Looks like I have a lot of work to do with you two.”

All that entailed was Seonghan bursting into their room unannounced at random times throughout the term, demanding a new wooing tip from Sooyoung, who was more than happy to comply.

“How do you do it, Soo?” Seonghan tossed a baseball up and down, once again on Haseul’s bed. “You got so many hoes fallin’ over themselves for you. But like, you ain’t a hoe, and no one thinks you’re one. How do you do it, man?”

“Start by not referring to women as hoes, I think. It’s kind of disrespectful,” Sooyoung said absentmindedly, eyes glued to her phone. She had been texting someone non-stop for the past hour.

Seonghan caught the ball, paused to consider, and nodded. “Oh dude, that makes sense.”

Haseul rolled her eyes from where she transcribed handwritten notes from lecture onto her laptop. It wasn’t something she really had to do, but it was an old habit. She threw herself into her studies with a fervor that spooked Seonghan to no end. It wasn’t as if she had anything better to do, though.

“Bro, when are you gonna stop studying? We’re bored,” Seonghan whined. He stretched his foot to nudge Haseul’s desk chair. She pulled her glasses off to send a glare his way. She glanced over at Sooyoung, and raised an eyebrow at the way she smiled fondly at her phone screen, like she was any common schoolgirl with a crush. It was oddly humanizing. Haseul felt her gay-idolizing-crush lenses fall as she set her real glasses back on her nose.

“I think Sooyoung’s having a fine time,” Haseul pointed out, focus back on the words scribbled in neat text on her color-coded notebook.

“Textin’ some hoe -- lady -- doesn’t count as being busy.”

“Let me know when you get a cute girl’s number,” Sooyoung said mildly, thumbs flying.

“I did! Yesterday, I told you!” Seonghan protested.

“Being project partners doesn’t count.”

“Hey, at least I initiated the asking for numbers. That’s more than Haseul’s ever done.”

Haseul ignored him for the moment, but the words on her page started to repeat themselves as her subconscious drifted. He was right. She had done her fair share of pining over girls who may or may not have been straight, but she had never actually done anything about it. But that was circumstance. Now that she was away from her hometown and living in a liberal college city, it was time to let her inner Sooyoung out for all the women to see.

She went to sleep that night, determined to get a cute girl’s number the very next day.

In class the next morning, a very, very pretty girl with light pink hair accidentally caught her eye from across the lecture hall, and smiled. Haseul prided herself on not freaking out. It happened again later on in lecture, after Haseul realized she had been absorbing none of the course material and instead thinking about that smile. The pretty girl’s eyes crinkled a bit behind round frames as her lips shyly curved up at Haseul again. This time, Haseul freaked out.

“Sooyoung.” Haseul was the one to burst into her own room later that evening, desperate. “Sooyoung, I need wooing tips. Now.”

“Hold on, ‘Wooming, my gay mess of a roommate needs help.” Sooyoung pulled the phone away from her ear and took in the disheveled mess that was Haseul. “A lot of help.” Her appraising look faded into a dopey, melty grin at the sound of a giggle on the other side of the line. Haseul straightened and rolled her eyes, panic immediately dissolved at the gross affection that Sooyoung had begun to embody recently.

“Never mind. I needed seasoned-veteran-lesbian-player Sooyoung, not whipped-for-the-literal-ray-of-sunshine-from-taekwondo-club Sooyoung,” Haseul said.

“You have a crush, don’t you?”

Haseul pursed her lips.

“A girl in one of your classes?”

Haseul shifted on one foot.

“She’s really pretty but you barely talked to her, if at all?”

Haseul’s eyes darted around the room.

Sooyoung snorted, phone already back up to her ear. “Come back for seasoned-veteran-lesbian Sooyoung when you’ve actually talked to the girl. No yeah. I know. Isn't she adorable? Hey, Jiwoo says you’re adorable.”

Haseul had that particular lecture three days a week. She started each class as she normally would, dutifully taking notes and writing neatly in her planner in between slides. But then she would (totally, completely, not purposefully) catch the pretty girl’s eye, and pretty girl would tilt her head the slightest bit and smile, and Haseul would flush red and avert her eyes. Her notes trailed off into hard scribbles of various curse words. Pretty girl was really taking a toll on her note-taking, so after four lectures of this, she finally decided to do something about it. Pretty girl sat in the same spot each class. Not that Haseul actively looked for her or something.

She wiped her sweaty palms on her flannel sleeves before heading over to sit in the empty seat beside her.

She screeched to a stop on one heel at the start to pretty girl’s row. Her head was down. She was rummaging through her backpack for materials before the professor started class. Haseul could still escape. It was a bad idea, anyway, to think that those smiles were anything but courteous classmate smiles borne of awkward eye contact and a nice personality saving Haseul from embarrassment each time --

“Oh, hello!”

Haseul’s inner monologue came to an abrupt halt as she realized pretty girl was looking at her, directly this time, with a bright smile and a tentative wave of her fingers.

“Did you want to sit here?”

Her smile began to waver as Haseul’s brain tried to catch up. Her features were so soft and inviting and her outfits were always so cute but simple and her smile and her voice and honestly Haseul had crushed on pretty girls before but _she_ \--

“O-oh, yeah! Yeah, if you don’t mind?” Belatedly, she realized that she was just standing there like a socially inept nerd, or an extremely useless lesbian. She wasn’t sure which was worse to be perceived as. Pretty girl didn’t need to know she was both just yet.

“Of course not. I’m Vivi, by the way.”

“Haseul,” Haseul managed. “So, you come to this class a lot?”

Seonghan laughed in her face when she recounted her story. Sooyoung had the decency to play her facepalm off as her running her hand through her hair.

“She giggled,” Haseul moaned. “It was so cute but I wanted to die.”

“Well, I actually got a girl’s number,” Seonghan said with a proud smirk. “Bet she’s cuter than Haseul’s girl.” Sooyoung required textual evidence, which somehow ended with Seonghan showing her all of Haseul’s most embarrassing childhood photos from his phone.

Haseul, amidst their dramatic cooing, vowed to get Vivi’s number.

Next lecture, she arrived earlier than Vivi (earlier than everyone, actually, including the professor), and awkwardly decided to sit in her usual seat. It would be too forward to sit where Vivi normally sat and expect her to join, right?

As the class began to fill in, Haseul realized with a frown that Vivi hadn’t shown up yet. Her usual seat remained unoccupied. With a small sigh of disappointment, she flipped open her notebook and prepared herself to tune into lecture for the first time in a few lectures.

“Is this seat taken?” A soft voice asked.

Haseul jumped. Vivi, sweater paws holding her things, hair tied up in a cute stem atop her head, stood beside her seat. The whole row was empty. Haseul looked up at her with wide eyes.

“Of course! I mean, no, you can sit here! Unoccupied!” Haseul cringed. Vivi merely smiled gratefully and took the seat right next to Haseul.

Haseul spent the rest of lecture desperately pretending to take notes as she tried not to think about how nice Vivi’s perfume smelled, and how Vivi caught her sneaking a glance but again only smiled that soft, slight smile, focus easily flitting from Haseul’s burning face back to the lecture.

“I’m so sorry I’m so awkward,” Haseul apologized as soon as lecture was over. Vivi only laughed.

“Don’t worry. I understand. Morning lectures are always hard.”

While not exactly the reason behind her awkwardness, Haseul agreed wholeheartedly. With common ground, they began to have an actual conversation, and Haseul found herself slipping easily out of her nervousness and into an easiness that surprised her as they headed out of the lecture hall together.

She learned a bit about Vivi. She learned that she grew up far away from their school, even farther than Haseul, and she wasn’t sure what she wanted to major in quite yet so she worked a part time job at a nearby roller rink while she figured it out. She learned that her favourite color was light pink, and she liked to wear pastel colors, especially in hot weather, which was also her favourite. She learned that she wasn’t currently in a relationship, but was open to looking for one.

They vibed incredibly well, from the way Haseul was able to coax out unbridled laughter from her with her lame jokes, and from the way Vivi listened eagerly in kind to Haseul’s own personal fun facts. Haseul was learning that crushes could be a nice distraction from schoolwork. And that she really, really liked girls. (But we been knew.)

She was about to learn what Vivi’s number was, when, of all people, Seonghan screeched at her from across the quad.

“Ay! ‘Seul! Haseul! Over here!” He waved with both arms, jumping up and down, drawing the whole campus’ attention to him.

“I don’t know you,” she shouted back. She hid her face from his view with her bookbag.

“Aw, come on, don’t treat your amazing boyfriend like that,” he huffed as he got closer, swatting her bookbag with his own, which resulted in a short tussle in which they smacked each other with their bags for a solid minute.

Eventually, Seonghan took notice of Haseul’s companion, who had been watching their interactions with amusement and slight confusion. “Oh, wassup Vivi!”

“You know Vivi?”

“You’re his girlfriend?”

“Yeah!”

“No!”

“No?”

“So you want to grab dinner sometime, Vivi?”

“No?”

“Yes!”

“What?”

The three blinked around at the others, confused.

Seonghan shook his head. “I gotta get to class, but I’ll text you! How does Friday sound?”

Vivi looked to Haseul, but Haseul was just as bewildered as she. “Good?” Vivi questioned.

Seonghan beamed. “Great! See you later, Vivi, and lame-ass ‘Seul!”

And just like that, Haseul learned that the girl whose number Seonghan had gotten was indeed real, and that it belonged to Vivi.

“How did he even get her number?” Jiwoo wondered from Sooyoung’s computer screen.

“I don’t know,” Haseul groaned. “She’s really nice, that’s how. Like, really nice. Her voice is really nice too.”

“She’s in deep,” Jiwoo said sagely, emphatic nodding pixelated in the dorm’s shitty wifi. Sooyoung still stared at the screen like it was the most beautiful work of art she’d ever seen. She hadn’t even so much as glanced at her Sunmi poster in months. Haseul realized the irony of Jiwoo’s words and would have laughed if she wasn’t busy being angsty.

“Doesn’t matter,” Haseul muttered. “Besides, she’s probably straight.”

“Not with the way you described, honey. No straight girl tells a full-on lesbian as the first conversation topic that she’s open to dating.” Jiwoo had somehow become far more invested in Haseul’s woeful crush than Haseul’s own roommate was, and she hadn’t even officially been introduced. Haseul had just slouched into her room and collapsed on her bed during their FaceTime call, and Jiwoo had demanded that she know all the details so she and Sooyoung could help.

“It wasn’t -- I didn’t even tell her I’m gay!” Haseul sputtered. 

“Sooyoungie, move your laptop, I can’t see her outfit. Is it a flannel again?”

“No, it’s the leather jacket, cuffed skinny jeans combo,” Sooyoung reported.

“You didn’t have to tell her, sweetie.” Jiwoo’s voice would be patronizing if it wasn’t so cute.

Haseul groaned. “Again, doesn’t matter. Seonghan’s going on a date with her.” And honestly, she was fine not telling him that Vivi was the same pretty girl she was crushing hard on. He was thick enough that he hadn’t connected the dots yet, and with all the years he had stuck by her side, she figured she owed him one. He wasn’t actually a terrible beard, or friend. With Sooyoung’s pro-tips, she was sure he could successfully woo Vivi and they would be cute together and she would be happy for them.

She thought about Vivi’s gentle smile and how it would no longer be directed at her.

She let out a sound that was less of a groan and more of a wounded animal noise.

“Seriously, let me see her, Soo. She’s gay catastrophizing the situation, isn't she?”

“She’s straight; I’m a hopeless gay,” Haseul cried into her bedspread. A stray, stale muffin crumb from what seemed so long ago pressed into her cheek.

“Hey, we don’t know that,” Sooyoung chided. “Where’s Seonghan taking her? I could give him some really bad places. The setting really makes or breaks a date, you know. One time I took a girl out to a roller skating rink. I thought, those kinds of dates have potential, right? And she was super cute. Pink hair, a cute little accent.”

Jiwoo let out a not-so-surreptitious noise. Haseul paused in her fake weeping.

“No, listen babe -- you know I only like you -- get this: Turns out she _worked_ at that roller rink! Like how was I supposed to know! She was really nice about it but --”

Jiwoo made a noise that sounded more like Haseul’s strangled sounds from earlier. “You only like me?”

Haseul full-on screeched, jumping up from her bed. _“You went out on a date with Vivi?!”_

“Yes, was it not obvious?” Sooyoung turned back and forth between the screen and her roommate. “And who?”

“Only me?” Jiwoo’s voice was garbled, probably because of the poor wifi connection.

“Wong. Vivi. Doe eyes, soft voice, bubblegum hair? Prettiest girl you’ve ever seen?” Haseul tried to contain her excitement.

“Oh, yeah, she went by the name Kahei, I think.” Sooyoung scrunched her nose up, trying to recall. Her eyebrows raised apologetically. “But it was only one date. It never lead to anything; she was super nice in letting me down. Stop freaking out, I promise I’m not trying to steal your girl.”

“Bro, I know you’re not,” Haseul snorted. “You’re way too in love with Jiwoo.”

“Yeah, I think I am.” A cheesy but genuine grin. This time it was clear despite the video quality that Jiwoo choked.

“I’m freaking out because,” Haseul took in a deep breath before grabbing at her hair and screaming, _“you, a lesbian, took her out on a date, which means I, also a lesbian, could take her out on a date!”_

“Correct,” Sooyoung confirmed.

Then the horrible realization settled back onto Haseul. Seonghan was taking Vivi out on Friday, which meant Vivi also dated boys. She was too late. Seonghan would win her over, and it wouldn’t matter that Vivi dated girls, because she would be dating Haseul’s best friend. She sunk back down onto the mattress with a defeated whine.

“Haseul, I love you, but we have to comfort you later. Sooyoung and I need to have words.” Jiwoo said.

“Love you too,” Haseul muttered, even though she hadn’t even met the girl in person. It was something about her that drew people in quickly, she guessed.

“Words?” Sooyoung wondered.

“Yes, words, Sooyoung. At my place. Right now.”

Sooyoung booked it out of their room at record time. Yes, it was something about Jiwoo that was so magnetic, just like Vivi, but in a different, more forthright way. Vivi was like a calm summer breeze. Vivi was so nice. Past tense.

Haseul ignored the onslaught of calls from Seonghan and pretended she was feeling unwell with “uh, lady problems. And allergies” so that he would leave her alone until after Friday. She skipped the last lecture of the week that she shared with Vivi. She moped in her room, tossing her deer plushie up and down, blasting sad songs as she went back to color-coding binders and doing normal academic work. What normally brought her joy (or at least a sense of purpose) lacked its appeal. Jiwoo came over and took turns babying her and Sooyoung, who pouted when Jiwoo would dote on Haseul for too long. The Saturday morning after D-day came along, and Jiwoo woke her up with a muffin and a hug.

Perhaps she was being dramatic, but the way her heart sunk as soon as Sooyoung and Jiwoo opened the door to head out and she saw Seonghan with a goofy smile on his face hurt just the same.

“I have super exciting news, bro!” He seemed so genuinely happy. Haseul sat up in bed, trying her best to be excited for him. He deserved someone as nice as Vivi.

“I don’t want you to feel weird about it, okay?” He cautioned, glaring at her as if she would dispute. She smiled thinly. He continued, grinning, self-satisfied. “So I went out with Vivi and bro, she is so nice! She’s honestly such girlfriend material yo, like it was hella fun hangin’ around her and she liked hangin’ around me too! So good news, bro! We’ll be seeing each other a lot more! You know why?”

Haseul clutched the muffin in her hand until it squished plaintively. She absentmindedly formed the chocolate-y amoeba into a ball, trying not to look up because if she did she might do something stupid like show how her little lesbian heart had just been officially crushed.

“Dude, ask me why!” Seonghan insisted.

“I know why,” Haseul mustered. “Congrats dude. I’m seriously happy for you.” The muffin looked pitiful in her palm.

She flinched back in surprise at a harsh flick to her forehead, pitching the muffin ball forward on reflex. Seonghan rolled his eyes down at her.

“Stop bein’ a crybaby and look at me!” He waved a small piece of paper in front of her face with one hand. With the other, he took a bite of the squished muffin.

Haseul shoved her glasses onto her face and snatched the paper from his hand.

It was a coupon to a roller rink.

Haseul looked up at him, slightly confused, slightly disgusted that he actually ate the object she had decided to take her angst out on.

“Idiot,” Seonghan said, and flipped the coupon around. Squished in sophisticated lettering on the back was a handwritten message:

_Dear Haseul (really cute girl who happens to be friends with Seonghan, really funny guy):_

_I was really sad you couldn’t make it tonight. I hope you’re feeling better! I have a good soup recipe I can give you in lecture next week. I hope you don’t mind me asking you out like this, but I get nervous around you too in class! >.<_

_I’d like it a lot if you wanted to come by. First skate lesson free. Taught by me,_

_Vivi_

Next to her name was a phone number. And a winky face.

“She was gonna put a heart, but I told her to do the winky face ‘cause I knew your face would get all red like that oh my god I’m gonna send her a picture --”

Haseul punched him in the stomach, and while he was doubled over in pain, used the momentum to drag him down so she could tackle him in a tight hug.

“Have I told you that you’re my most favourite fake boyfriend ever?”

Seonghan wheezed like how he had so many years ago when Haseul had accidentally sent a curveball too hard and the force of it sent his catcher’s mitt into his own gut. He had still held on, though, making it a strike-out. Together, they had won the sandlot championships of fifth grade.

“What are bros for?” Seonghan finally managed, returning the hug, and smashing the rest of the muffin against Haseul’s ear.

When Sooyoung returned, it was to the peaceful sight of Seonghan at Haseul’s desk poring over a textbook, and Haseul criss-crossed on her bed grinning goofily at her phone screen.

She blinked and stepped back out, phone already ringing.

“Sooyoung?”

Sooyoung’s voice was urgent. “There’s been a role reversal, and it’s freaking me out so I need you to pick me up right now immediately.”

“Alright,” Jiwoo laughed, “bro.”

_“I swear to Sunmi --”_

**Author's Note:**

> steak with a side of fries medium rare lightly salted
> 
> help me come up with actually good titles bc ao3 legendary author nxpenthe wanted me to title it the above phrase and i can't work alone in this kind of environment


End file.
